Gaston always fighter

Gaston always fighter
BY FRANCES SPOTSWOOD
News staff writer
"I'm alive," Arthur George Gaston announced in a firm, clear voice as he was rolled on a stretcher past friends and relatives wiating in the hospital
emergency room corridor
Saturday morning.
That was after the wealthy
Birmingham businessman was
beaten, handcuffed and kid-
naped from his home in a period of predawn violence. It was after Gaston contributed a bit to
his rescue when officers stopped
... the car in which he was a prison-
er, a sack over his head and a
blanket bundled around him.
GASTON
"I'm A.G. Gaston and that's the man who kidnaped me," he called through the wrappings to the officers who were asking the driver for his license.
Commented a close associate, "He's a fighter. He never has been one to give in to adversity. And Mrs. Gaston is cut from the same cloth. They fought that man. The bedroom, the broken furniture, tell that story."
Minnie Gaston, sometimes referred to by her husband as "my dynamo," struggled loose from the bed where the man left her tied and handcuffed. She telephoned the alarm.
The Gastons are no strangers to violence. Their home was fire-bombed. The Gaston Motel was blasted during the racial disturbances of the 1960's.
As black and white leaders worked to bring disrupted Birmingham together, and the leaders did not always see eye-to-eye on how this should be done, Dr. Gaston would often offer this bit of advice: "Don't get mad. Get smart."
BUT THE LAST DECADE has been one of peace for the Gastons. A time of growth in the financial world, multiple calls to civic duties and high esteem in Birmingham and beyond.
Two months ago it was announced that Dr. and Mrs. Gaston would be the first two people inducted into a planned "Hall of Distinguished Citizens" at Birmingham City Hall.
That's a far cry from the days back in Marengo County when a little black boy called Art began his first business enterprise�selling turns on his swing to neighbor children for buttons and pins.
It is a far cry from the days when Gaston, just beginning to make his mark in business, courted and wed Minnie Lee Gardner who was a young school teacher fresh out of Tuskegee Institute.
He called on his wife to take over the fledgling Booker T. Washington Business College to teach business skills and pride in performance to black students.
Mrs. Gaston is nationally credited with getting scholarships for vocational training included in the federal grants-in-aid program for college students.
With the current rash of kidnapings throughout the world, friends have urged the Gastons to take some security measures. But Gaston referred to a friend surrounded by bodyguards and said, "He is a prisoner in his own home. I don't want to live like that."
Lately Gaston, at 83, and Mrs. Gaston have been trying to shed some of their business and civic responsibilities to make more time for travel which they both enjoy.

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Gaston always fighter
BY FRANCES SPOTSWOOD
News staff writer
"I'm alive," Arthur George Gaston announced in a firm, clear voice as he was rolled on a stretcher past friends and relatives wiating in the hospital
emergency room corridor
Saturday morning.
That was after the wealthy
Birmingham businessman was
beaten, handcuffed and kid-
naped from his home in a period of predawn violence. It was after Gaston contributed a bit to
his rescue when officers stopped
... the car in which he was a prison-
er, a sack over his head and a
blanket bundled around him.
GASTON
"I'm A.G. Gaston and that's the man who kidnaped me," he called through the wrappings to the officers who were asking the driver for his license.
Commented a close associate, "He's a fighter. He never has been one to give in to adversity. And Mrs. Gaston is cut from the same cloth. They fought that man. The bedroom, the broken furniture, tell that story."
Minnie Gaston, sometimes referred to by her husband as "my dynamo," struggled loose from the bed where the man left her tied and handcuffed. She telephoned the alarm.
The Gastons are no strangers to violence. Their home was fire-bombed. The Gaston Motel was blasted during the racial disturbances of the 1960's.
As black and white leaders worked to bring disrupted Birmingham together, and the leaders did not always see eye-to-eye on how this should be done, Dr. Gaston would often offer this bit of advice: "Don't get mad. Get smart."
BUT THE LAST DECADE has been one of peace for the Gastons. A time of growth in the financial world, multiple calls to civic duties and high esteem in Birmingham and beyond.
Two months ago it was announced that Dr. and Mrs. Gaston would be the first two people inducted into a planned "Hall of Distinguished Citizens" at Birmingham City Hall.
That's a far cry from the days back in Marengo County when a little black boy called Art began his first business enterprise�selling turns on his swing to neighbor children for buttons and pins.
It is a far cry from the days when Gaston, just beginning to make his mark in business, courted and wed Minnie Lee Gardner who was a young school teacher fresh out of Tuskegee Institute.
He called on his wife to take over the fledgling Booker T. Washington Business College to teach business skills and pride in performance to black students.
Mrs. Gaston is nationally credited with getting scholarships for vocational training included in the federal grants-in-aid program for college students.
With the current rash of kidnapings throughout the world, friends have urged the Gastons to take some security measures. But Gaston referred to a friend surrounded by bodyguards and said, "He is a prisoner in his own home. I don't want to live like that."
Lately Gaston, at 83, and Mrs. Gaston have been trying to shed some of their business and civic responsibilities to make more time for travel which they both enjoy.